'Seeking a Friend' (for a ride to South Jersey) at 'the End of the World'

Darren MichaelsSteve Carell stars as Dodge in "Seeking a Friend for the End of the World."

It’s the end of the world. The reason doesn’t matter — rogue planets, asteroids, ancient Mayan prophecies — the fact is, it’s here. Now, the only question is: How are you going to go out?

It’s been a recurring movie question lately, and the general answer’s been — not well.

“2012” had the 1 percent grabbing the only tickets out of town; “Melancholia” showed families falling apart; “4:44 Last Day on Earth” starred bitter artists holing up in their apartments. “Contagion” (although it averted the disaster in the end) featured paranoia and martial law.

“Seeking a Friend for the End of the World” takes a more upbeat downbeat approach.

When the movie starts, the world has three weeks left — and our hero Dodge’s marriage has just ended, abruptly. He has no children and hasn’t spoken to his father in years. His job now defines pointlessness — really, selling insurance during the apocalypse? — and his friends have embraced who-cares hedonism.

And so Dodge decides to do something completely innocent, and romantic, and probably pointless. He seeks out his high school sweetheart.

You may think you know how this is going to work out, as the film embraces a few clichés early on (yes, there is a “kooky” young female character who’s here to wake Dodge up to life).

Yet it takes so many other, interesting twists.

All are clearly due to director and screenwriter Lorene Scafaria, a Garden Stater who already gave us some shout-outs in her adaptation of “Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist.” She hits some obvious notes in this directorial debut, but also comes up with some wonderfully odd riffs.

There’s the trip to a chain restaurant, for example, where the happy-to-serve-you staff have decided to stage a 24-hour bacchanal. Or the suburban party where the new nihilists shed their business suits to do hard drugs and get little kids blotto, like a “Mad Men” episode guest-directed by Roman Polanski.

But mostly there’s Penny, the narcoleptic neighbor whom Dodge ends up taking his romantic road trip with. She is a woman of many retro loves — Converse sneakers, vinyl, the Tijuana Brass. Also — that most old-fashioned love of all — love itself.

Keira Knightley, who rarely gets a chance to play contemporary roles, let alone comedy, is marvelously winning as Penny, all sharp elbows and dark laughter. And Steve Carell is fine, too, as Dodge (although he needs to mix it up more in his career — the part feels like another in a long line of self-pitying sad sacks).

But what really helps these actors shine is that Scafaria gives them the room to find these characters, and their rhythm together, as they take a truck and head toward South Jersey. And she gives us enough credit to provide a story without too many bizarre coincidences, unbelievable twists or unsatisfyingly “satisfying” endings.

Instead, she very simply, and rather bravely, delivers a movie that’s exactly about what the title says it’s going to be about — searching for a bit of human contact while we still can. A movie that may be, in its own small, weird way, the most bizarrely bittersweet and oddly beautiful romance you’ve seen in quite awhile.

Ratings note: The film contains strong language, drug and alcohol abuse, and violence.

'Seeking a Friend for the End of the World'

(R) Focus (94 min.)

Directed by Lorene Scafaria. With Steve Carell, Keira Knightley. Now playing in New Jersey.